0 to work, to come out of bagram. no way to keep bagram and go to effective zero in >> well, thinking of what we have -- may have gained or may have lost as we leave. we think about countering adversaries, so again, general mckenzie what is your assessment of the foreign influence in afghanistan, the wake of our - hosted what we called the conference. we all adversaries from filling the we talk about that region after the fall of afghanistan. generally what they want is they want assurance. they want to continue to have ties with the united states because they want alternatives to russia and they want alternatives to china. unfortunately because of the geographic location, they'll always have to deal with russia and china. our partners in the region want a message that the united states is not going to turn our back on them even though we left afghanistan. we had a productive conference based on those themes. >> i couldn't agree more. it makes us more vulnerable if we allow anybody else to fill that vacuum. i'd like to touch briefly on the fate of afghan women. what we've seen regarding the status of women in territories where the taliban gained control before overthrowing the afghan government. we know how horrible the conditions are for women. what do you see moving forward for the fate of afghan women, what can we do, what do you see as a future for women in afghanistan. >> during our long engagement, we made great strides in educational and other opportunities for women in afghanistan. i think those are gravely at risk with the return of the taliban. the levers that we have are economic and diplomatic, which are not part of the department of defense. that's how we have to work the problem. i think there's opportunity. it will be long a matter of months that we can force the taliban down a path based on their desire to have international financing, recognition and relief of sanctions and things that are very important to them. we have to be hard-nosed as we negotiate to make sure the gains are not lost. >> thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate the hearing today and i'll be submitting more questions nor the record. >> thank you, senator rosen. senator blackburn, please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general milley, i want to come back to you. we discussed that you have had conversations with woodward, costa, rucker and bender on their books. correct? >> not costa. >> not costa. >> what about -- >> woodward yes and others. >> we'll leave that as a point of discussion. in any of these conversations did you discuss private meetings with the president or white house officials? >> white house officials perhaps. president, i don't think so. >> so you never discussed any of your conversations with president trump? >> with president trump? >> with any of these -- >> not a private conversation. >> did you portray the commander-in-chief in a negative light or make comments that were critical of the commander-in-chief to any of these authors with which you've had conversations? >> not my comments or my observations, no. others that were relayed to me from others perhaps. >> i'm looking forward to your book report on this. would you see these conversations as an abuse of executive privilege? >> i would not, no. >> you would not. okay. let me ask you this. what is your standard for determining when to leap private conversations with a president? >> i don't leak private conversations with the president. >> you did not? so you had these conversations with the authors but you don't see that as leaking information to which they were not entitled to know? this is the problem that we have. as a member of this committee and as someone who represents a lot of our men and women in uniform that are there as we have referenced today, i really got an issue with the fact that you will talk to authors, but then you all come in here and you say we can't tell you what we told the president. then i have to drag it out of you that the written document switch under article 2, you're supposed to give those to us, you can't go hide behind somebody's skirts on this and you don't want to give those to us. so you have repeatedly told this committee that you will not reveal your private conversations with president biden, but then you have leaked this information from your meetings with president trump. so it is important to us that you truthfully respond to us on this. i think what you did with making time to talk to these authors, burnishing your image, kind of building that bluster, but then not putting the focus on afghanistan and what was happening there. general milley, this is disappointing to me. i know it's disappointing to people that have served with you or under you, under your command. it does not serve our nation well. you talked a little bit earlier about the damage. you said damage was the right word to use when assessing what has happened in afghanistan when you look at america's credibility. so how do you look the men and women in the eye that have served under your command, how do you look young men in the eye that are coming to our military academy days and who want to serve and say, you can depend on me. i have your back. because you know what? i think a lot of these families right now, they don't feel like you have their back. the special ops guys i met with friday in my office in nashville that are taking their time, their money and risking their lives to do a job that the three of you could not do, maybe we're going to remember you three as the three that broke the military. i don't know. but this is causing just a lot of anger from people who have trusted the military. they have felt like the military was one of the most trustworthy institutions. but in order to get a name in a book, in order to not be drawn in to a political fight, what you have managed to do is to politicize the u.s. military to downgrade our reputation with our allies. nobody has resigned, nobody has submitted their resignation. we've got thousands of people watching this hearing today that are looking at you all and saying, i can't believe they're sitting there and not answering the questions and are trying to punt. i yield back. >> thank you. now let me recognize senator kelly. >> thank you, mr. chairman. earlier today i had the opportunity to ask some questions. at the time because we were short on time, i didn't have the opportunity to thank all three of you, general milley, secretary austin, general mckenzie for your service to our country serving in combat, overseas, multiple deployments. you know, your family has served as well. all of your families. i want to thank you personally for that. it is a big commitment. i understand it. secretary austin, since u.s. troops departed kabul the number of evacuation flights has been small. the state department briefed that four charter flights deported with u.s. support. the ability to leave by a land route is even less. the testimony today is that the mission is ongoing. can you explain what role the military has in evacuation efforts being led by the state department? >> you are correct, senator. it's led by the state department and it's an interagency effort. so as general milley and i said earlier, we do have a senior officer participating in that cell that is run by ambassador bass. they're reaching out to a number of different entities, veterans groups, many of your colleagues who have information that can be helpful in contacting people who have a desire to get out and have the right credentials. if they don't have the right credentials, are there things that we can do to help them obtain those credentials if they have helped us work with us in the past or if they're an american citizen with expired credentials. >> do you anticipate that there will be transport from third countries, many of our afghan allies have left and now find themselves in a third country, should we expect there's flights out of those places as well? >> i think those individuals as they work with our embassy personnel and those various countries to help us help them, again, if they qualify as one of the people that helped us in the past. certainly either taking a routine commercial flight or taking a charter flight that we can help sponsor. i do anticipate there will be some sort of activity in the future. again, i don't want to speak for the state department. i will tell you, senator, from a dod perspective we'll do everything we can to help enable this effort. >> throughout this evacuation effort, my office worked closely with groups of former afghan pilots and women who served in addition to american citizens and veterans working to assist them in leaving the country. these are men and women who trained with us, who fought with us and who are at heightened risk because of it. i'm concerned that they were not a priority in our evacuation efforts. that guidance on immigration options for them has been inadequate. due to the challenges and uncertainties of accessing evacuation flights, many evacuees sought alternative means of escape for the third party countries as i mentioned. how have the defense department working with state to ensure these individuals don't fall through the cracks with regards to resettlement? >> again, i'd have to defer to state in terms of outlining what the resettlement processes are. in terms of direct activity from the department of defense, we don't have much. we're not a big part of that effort, the resettlement effort in third countries. >> thank you, mr. secretary. again, i want to thank all three of you for being here today and thank you for your service. >> thanks very much, senator kelly. senator hawley. >> thank you. general milley, i have one more question for you about these many book interviews that you did. "frankly we did win this election." seems like it's a significant outlay of time. >> i don't think so. i think -- >> they were short interviews? >> relatively short. i don't think it took -- >> what was the time frame on these interviews for these three different books. by the way, these are for folks that don't know at home, you said you don't read the books. i don't think many people do. they're d.c. tell-all insider books. what was the time frame that you said you did these interviews? >> i would say it took a couple hours maybe. >> when? what is the time frame? when were you sitting for them? dates. >> i can get you the dates. i don't know. >> this year? >> off the top of my head. >> 2021? >> oh, yeah. >> so it was this calendar year? >> i think so, yeah. >> i am wondering, clearly this is a priority for you. you did these interviews on the record, these reporters -- >> i did interviews on the record, off the record and background interviews and i do it with print media, television media, books, dock men tearies, all kinds of things. >> why would you do background on off-the-record interviews? background means you can't quote you -- if the goal is transparency? >> the transparency goes to the fact to make sure that we're explaining ourselves, make sure that these authors have correct no, sir. let's take woodward, for example. probably 200 people interviewed and approached any guys to say are these facts true, this is what we heard. we clarify and mitigate any incorrect -- >> interesting. i -- it's interesting. your doing the interviews and doing them in 2021. makes me wonder the books, were you a little distracted about what was going on in afghanistan? general miller testified to this committee that he warned and the rapid erosion of the military situation in afghanistan as early as march of 2021. he further testified that he informed you about hi views on this. his said the collapse of the afghan government could come very fast in 2021. >> hard and fast. >> he said he informed you of, this he said he informed secretary austin of this. >> he did. >> at the same time in june, you said an outright takeover of the taliban is unlikely. that is at an armed services committee in the house, june 23. in july you said the afghanistan forces have the capacity to fight and defend their country. you also said they were well-equipped. on june 17, you told the senate appropriations committee the afghan government had a 350,000 person security force which we know is a drastic overestimate. a few days later you lowered that to 300,000 which we still know is a drastic overestimate. your generals on the ground is saying one thing. the taliban has a massive offensive underway from may 1 on but yet you told us very different things in public. how do you reconcile those things? what am i missing? >> well, first of all, scott miller did say hard and fast. he also meant that at least to me and to others that he meant that to be in the fall, october, november, maybe even december time frame. >> i heard you say that earlier. i'm curious about that. that wasn't his testimony to this committee. >> when he said in the committee is hard and fast. he didn't put a date on it. i don't know. did he? >> no, he didn't put a date on it. you did. that's what intrigues me. >> he did put a date on it to me and to us. and when pressed, it was after we leave, point one, which was 31 august, and probably into the october time frame, maybe thanksgiving and that is about more or less where many of the intel assessments -- >> he said he was the dissenter on the intel assessment. >> that's right. >> he didn't put any of those qualifiers on his testimony to us. so are you saying he shifted his testimony, general milley? >> no. i'm saying what he told me it was likely in the october time frame. the intel assessments of centering around november, thanksgiving at the latest. christmas. some went into the next year. here's my point. the intel assessments had two basic things in my view. was the scale and scope, plus the speed. all the intel assessments, all of us, got that wrong. there's no question about it. that was a swing and a miss on the intel assessment of 11 day theres august. there's nobody that called that. >> my time is about -- i appreciate it. you made these points. my time is about to expire. i want to say this. it seems to me that you put a high priority on making sure that you were favorably portrayed by the d.c. press corps. fair enough if that's your priority. at the same time, we had a disastrous situation in afghanistan with the death of 13 soldiers and hundreds of civilians and americans left behind. in my view, that mission cannot be called a success in any way shape or form. general, i think you should resign. secretary austin, i think you should resign. i think this mission was a catastrophe. there's no other way to say it and has to start with you. >> your time has expired. senator tubberville. >> thanks. general milley, you have spoken a lot about civilian control of the military. i appreciate the statements about that. june 10 i asked for formal questions about bagram air field and pointed out that having a major air base with 500 miles of iranian and chinese borders would be very strategic. i asked you about the feasibility of retaining bagram. i'm still waiting for a reply. i hope you do see today ignoring questions that might come up from civilian oversight sometimes backfires on you a little bit. you apologize for being late for your statement today. the hearing. but you got to understand the pattern here. i heard senator blackburn say about the book. you got to see how the midst of it looks to congress that you've had time to interview and do all of these interviews, but questions are not answered. i'm just troubled by some of those things. also on august 18, you said "there's nothing that i or anyone else saw that indicated a collapse of the army and this government in 11 days." i find it unbelievable with a staff -- your staff of 3,200 people and a budget of $419 million dollars that we didn't see the obvious. i think you saw it. july 11, 2019, you said i think pulling out prematurely would be a strategic mistake." you said here today and you also said that here today. you agree? >> i 100% agree. >> thank you. >> may i comment? >> go ahead. >> on your first two points. on the intel piece, i stay with what i said. nobody called it. 11 days in august. nobody did that. i brought the intel reports in a classified session. happy to go over them on the first thing. the bagram thing, i did put a very lengthy response in my written statement. i don't know if you had an opportunity to read it yet. i encourage you to read it. something that general mckenzie put in his. i can assure you that we looked at that whole bagram issue carefully. >> here's what i'm struggling with, general mckenzie. 1945, we left japan. they're one of our biggest allies of the day. we're still there. germany the say way. korea, the same way. we had 2,500 troops. the war stopped in 2014. we started what? operation resolute support. we're having all of these people -- folks, we're going to pay for what we just did. i'm got young kids. ya'll got kids and grandkids. we're going to be back in there fighting. what are your thoughts about that, general mckenzie? we're not talking about the president. what do you think about the future of what we have to do in afghanistan. >> so we have very few levers in afghanistan right now. because we completely pulled out. >> will we be back? >> i think we're always going to reserve the right to go in to go after isis and al-qaeda targets as they present themselves. we've been clear on that. that's not going to be easy. we'll talk more about that in the closed session. it's not easy to do that. it will be possible to do that. as for larger engagements with the taliban or whatever government follows them, that is a hard road. from where i sit -- i see a small slice of that. that is a question for diplomats and others to talk about how our future relationship with the government as a whole will be. i think -- my judgment will be they will regress over the next few years with the taliban in charge. >> we can't afford to survive with our military. we got that kind of money. it burns me up that we're eventually going to have to go back there, we're going to have problems here. i think we should have looked at it -- i know president biden wanted to get out. president trump wanted to get out. i disagreed with it. we gave up the best base in that area. just amazing to me that we're going to have to go back and hopefully -- what are your thoughts about it action we end it up here, secretary austin? >> i don't think it's preordained that we're going to have to go back, senator. i will tell you, what you heard us say, that we recognize that trans national terrorists will migrate to ungoverned spaces. we're committed to not allowing al-quaida to regenerate and be able to export terror from afghanistan to the united states of america. we'll remain laser focused on that going forward and do everything in our power to make sure that doesn't happen. >> thank you. one question. are you against dishonorable discharges to the military for not taking a vaccine? you're the leader of the dod. >> i am the leader. again, we have a nonjudicial -- excuse me, a ucmj that really addresses all of the issues in the military and gives our leadership what they need to be able to enforce standards. taking a vaccine is a requirement. again, i'll just leave it at that. >> thank you very much, senator tubberville. gentlemen, thank you very much. this has been a long day and we still have a closed session. there's a vote ongoing now. so i would suggest we reconvene in svc 2017 at 3:45. we'll give you an opportunity for a brief respite. very brief. with that, i will adjourn the open session. >> martha: there you have it. a lot of ground covered on the tumultuous exit from afghanistan. the 13 u.s. service members that were lost at the abbey gate and all of those left behind, sizs, people that helped us, interpreters on the ground over 20 years and a number of americans said to be less than 100 although we heard estimates that go higher than that. this is an important record that is being put down today of our history in afghanistan. 2400 service members lost, 20,000 wounded in that longest war in american history. so it's important that we go down these roads and we ask the questions being asked today. joining me is former u.n. ambassador, nikki haley here today. we're also joined by fox news senior strategic analyst, general jack keane, chairman of the institute for the study of war. general keane, start with you, if i may. what do you think is the biggest take-away and what did we learn that you think is the most important? >> well, first of all, i think sort of the opening chapter and what we're going to see and going to take some time to understand how afghanistan unravelled after 20 years. certainly i found this hearing to be -- even someone that pays close attention to be quite informative. i think the witnesses testifying today obviously senior leaders of our military, i thought they were forthright and honest and clearly they pulled no punches. general milley called this withdrawal a strategic failure. we've lost afghanistan to the taliban. it's pretty obvious. he's willing to use those words which frames it in my judgment quite accurately. he also said and quite informative, something the american people need to hear because they haven't been hearing it and that is that u.s. credibility has been damaged by what has taken place. we now have a terrorist organization in charge of afghanistan. i think that is absolutely the most significant things that was said here. i found many other things to be also quite informative. certainly listen, getting these leaders on the record that they were fundamentally opposed to this withdrawal that president biden wanted to conduct. if you read in between the lines and what secretary austin was saying and general milley was saying, they went through in some depth in terms of the options, the alternatives, the risks, et cetera. there's no doubt in my mind that the president of the united states was well-informed as to what their concerns were about an unconditional withdrawal that he announced with a date certain on 31 august. also, i think the other thing that was -- go ahead. >> martha: no, i just want to play, if i may, general keane, this is the sound bite from president biden talking to george stephanopoulos. what he said about whether or not he received input and advice from his military leaders that he really should leave 2,500 and in some cases they thought more than that of our troops on the ground to hold the situation in place. watch. >> your military advisers say no, we should keep 2, 500 troops, it's been a stable situation, we can do that, we can continue to do that? >> no, no one said that to me that i can recall. >> martha: how damaging is that given what we heard today? >> well, when i heard it the first time, i didn't believe it. it's been well-reported on fox that the military and intelligence community and some aspect of the state department, possibly even someone as senior as secretary blinken were all opposed to this withdrawal. to deny that he hadn't heard it, i mean, that is really a serious misstep on his part. i didn't believe it and don't believe it now. we have evidence on the record that that is not the case. remember, the senators did focus on did the president hear your voices on this issue to include general milley's voice. the testimony provided to the senators, yes, the president did hear it. it wasn't transmitted through second and third parties. they heard the passion and the conviction of the principals involved that were responsible for executing the mission in afghanistan. >> martha: just one more question for you, sir. i mean, i would tick off a number of items where president biden has been proven to be incorrect in a course of what we've seen. these are based on the facts on the ground. he said the taliban would not take over, the afghan forces would stand up. we know those are not true. he said al-quaida was gone from the region. we heard from his top brass today that that is not the case. al-quaida is not gone. they're concerned that they may be coming back. let's play this sound bite about where we stand on the war in terror. watch this. this is milley and mckenzie saying they believe the war on terror is not over. >> i recommended that we maintain 2,500 troops in afghanistan. >> remain consistent throughout that we should keep a steady state of 2,500 and could bounce to 3,500. >> martha: just to correct the record, the one is i was looking for, senator tillis said is the war on terror over. general mckenzie said the war on terror and the war in afghanistan is not over that from general mckenzie. >> yeah, i absolutely agree with that statement. the thing that nobody wanted was the taliban to take over afghanistan because everybody knows that it will be likely become an epicenter again certainly for al-quaida because they will obviously have a safe haven and isis in ungoverned space because there's no way the taliban can control all of afghanistan. they don't have enough forces or people to do anything like that. so these organizations are going to grow. that's what these commanders are so concerned about. yes, al-quaida is in other places. in every one of those places, syria, iraq, isis there as well, yemen and east africa, we are very close to that enemy force. we can approach them with ease. it's not over the horizon. that is their concern here. they said it's not impossible. but it's going to be very hard is the words they're using to describe it. it's not so much conducting a strike. it's to get the daily intelligence that we're able to get from the afghan security forces, from the people itself, from the fact that we had seven military bases and multiple c.i. bases as listening posts. with all of that gone, you can't get that information at 10,000 feet. it's just not possible. yes, can we conduct a strike when we got some information? yeah. but getting the information is going to be the problem. >> martha: sorry, general. i want to play this one last thing from senator blackburn and let you go. i want your reaction to all of this discussion about his participation in several of these anti-trump books. >> maybe we're going to remember you three as the three that broke the military. i don't know. but this is causing just a lot of anger from people who have trusted the military. they felt like the military was the most trustworthy institutions. in order to get a name in a book, in order to not be drawn in to a political fight, what you have managed to do is to politicize the u.s. military to downgrade our reputation with our allies. nobody has resigned, nobody has submitted their resignation. >> martha: there's a lot there. i want a quick thought from you and then bring in ambassador hailey. your thoughts. >> with two quick points. milley's testimony on the so-called china calls, the one that he initiated and secretary esper, the one with the chinese, there's ample justification that he was responsible in doing that. certainly he has the intelligence to prove why there's some concern. i've seen somebody that a -- i know somebody that has seen it and it's credible. the senators will see that. the second thing, however, if i was the secretary of defense, i would issue to all of my leaders a proclamation that you're not going to discuss why you're on active duty, while you're serving this administration with the media anonymously, on background, what we're doing in executing our job here. you're going to sign a nondisclosure agreement and if you violate it, you're fired regardless of your rank and position and regardless of what you've done with your life before that. this nonsense has to start. milley was appropriate executing his duties. he's wrong talking to these people while he's still executing his duties. if he's retired like i am and want to expand it, that's another matter. >> martha: thanks, general. good to have you here today. i want to bring in former ambassador nikki haley. great to have you with us today. i know you've been watching this with great interest. what really jumped out at you as you watched these three military leaders testify about what happened in afghanistan? >> martha, i think we heard from our generals about what transpired, the person we need to hear from is the president of the united states. i mean, this even caused more questions i think for president biden, which is okay, you said none of your military said anything to you about keeping forces on the ground, about keeping bagram air force because, all that. you said you couldn't recall it. well, clearly your generals said they told you. so we need an answer. we need the trust on that. you lied once on that. then you say that the afghan military, that he was told the afghan military could stand on their own. the generals countered that again and told him the risk he was taking by doing that. that is not the case. then you say al-quaida is not in afghanistan. all of your generals said al-quaida is very much in afghanistan and oh, by the way, when the taliban took over, they let out all of those al-quaida prisoners that are now throughout afghanistan. there's so many questions. he said that they wouldn't leave any americans behind. you left americans behind. so i think we heard some hard truths from the generals. that elevated a lot more questions for president biden. he owes the american people, he owes the military and answers as to why he made these decisions and put his military through this. >> martha: i'm curious what you think about the way they spoke about the doha agreement. there was a put of leaning on that. if there's any reason why it all fell apart, it was because of the doha agreement. that was an agreement with the taliban, the afghan national forces and leadership were not included with the trump administration. it was the beginning of trying to begin the exit process what did you think about that? >> the reason the afghan government wasn't included, the taliban said they wouldn't negotiate if the afghan government was involved. that's problem number 1. number 2 is that the taliban is the taliban. i don't care what they say. they're going to be who they are. you can't change that kind of ideology overnight. they believe what they believe. they hate america. you know, they have dead bodies hanging in the streets to show people whatnot to do that is the taliban. so i don't think we ever should have trusted the taliban. it's why i adamant that we can't recognize the taliban. no aid should go to them. they're a terrorist organization and you can't help a terrorist organization. >> martha: in regard to senator blackburned exchange on why he would be spending all this thyme in 2021 while there was so many things sort of falling apart in afghanistan, spend all of this time, he said several hours, he couldn't how much, talking to these authors writing these books trashing the trump administration is that appropriate and does it as she said politicize the military and down grade our relationships with our allies? >> it's the most unprofessional thing i've seen. even as a cabinet member, you don't talk to someone writing a book if -- you don't talk to journalists and books or any of that. that is political. in the military? they're so conscious about not politicizing what they do. the idea that he would sit down and do these tell-all books just boggles the mind. i know my husband. he can't take a picture in uniform. i can't -- you have to be careful about when journalists you talk to, what you say. i can't imagine that general milley didn't know that. i have to think he has a lot of regrets right now. >> martha: one of the lines in the woodward book, quoting from milley, if we atalk, i'll call you ahead of time. he claims that conversation was above board and the kind of conversation he he's a all the time. >> i think he tried to explain what that was. i have the bigger concern is the process. normally if i had a conversation and the chinese came to me and said we're concerned about this, is this going to happen, i would have that conversation with them and send a read-out or pick up the phone and call everyone else that is affected by that and send it to the national security agency and make sure that everybody got the read-out. he said that he spoke with -- whether it was secretary pompeo or mark meadows, his counter parts about that call and what took place. so i think he answered the question that that happened. but it only brought up more questions of what was the allegation that the chinese were making. i think talking in this tell-all was just poor judgment on his part, which leads to there was poor judgment with this whole afghanistan debacle starting at the top with joe biden. he has to answer. he doesn't get a pass from answering reporter's questions on you lied and said that the military didn't tell you and actually multiple generals told you don't do this. this is a mistake. >> martha: we don't have time to play it but i would encourage kevin cramer's exchange when he wanted to know why the president was taking a victory lap over the strike against terrorists in afghanistan, which turned out to be seven children and aid workers and we have not heard from the president on that debacle either. ambassador and former governor of south carolina, nikki haley. always good to have you with us. thanks for making time with us today. >> thank you. >> martha: so moments ago, the white house defending president biden for choosing to not leave troops on the ground in afghanistan. katie pavlich is here to respond to everything that we've heard today on the hill. also, ahead today, the other big story, dog the bounty hunter shares an exclusive update on the tip that he's investigating into brian laundrie's whereabouts as the petito family speaks out. we'll show you what they said today next. off